Astronomy General Space Discussion

[CD Xbow]

Lost in Space, well not quite, we'll find out soon if Butch and Suni are stuck in space.

Cards on the table: Are Butch and Suni coming home on Starliner or Crew Dragon?

On the eve of a fateful decision, we're answering some frequently asked questions.

arstechnica.com

Added: NASA have announced Butch and Suni are having a stay over, a real long stay over until next year when they will return to Earth in a crewed Dragon. Starliner will be come back to Earth under remote control. More bad PR for Boeing.

NASA Decides to Bring Starliner Spacecraft Back to Earth Without Crew - NASA

NASA will return Boeing’s Starliner to Earth without astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams aboard the spacecraft, the agency announced Saturday. The

www.nasa.gov

 

[CD Xbow]

WIMPS are out, mostly. Latest search for pixie dust a dark matter candidate has failed - no WIMPs allowed!

The world's most sensitive detector has found no sign of dark matter. So where is it?

Scientists have yet to find evidence of WIMPs — one of the main contenders for dark matter — in the most sensitive test yet made. We explain what the new results mean.

www.abc.net.au

 

[CD Xbow]

Scientist have measured Earths global electric field for the first time. This has been suspected for a long time because there was evidence of ions escaping above the poles. Nice animation in the vid. The field has a strength of only half a volt but is able to fling ions into space.

NASA Discovers a Long-Sought Global Electric Field on Earth - NASA Science

An international team of scientists has successfully measured a planet-wide electric field thought to be as fundamental to Earth as its gravity and magnetic fields. Known as the ambipolar electric field, scientists first hypothesized over 60 years ago that it drove atmospheric escape above...

science.nasa.gov

 

[TheGoatBaron]

Who here thinks we’re close to finding alien lifeforms? Personally, I think we’re getting close to it. Reckon in the next 25 years, we’ll find alien lifeforms. The James Web Telescope has made some amazing discoveries. The next telescope will probably find life if the JWT doesn’t

 

[GreyCrow]

Define alien life forms?

Are we talking microbial life or walking talking barking anthropological form?

 

[TheGoatBaron]

Define alien life forms?

Are we talking microbial life or walking talking barking anthropological form?

Either to be honest

 

[MP_]

Who here thinks we’re close to finding alien lifeforms? Personally, I think we’re getting close to it. Reckon in the next 25 years, we’ll find alien lifeforms. The James Web Telescope has made some amazing discoveries. The next telescope will probably find life if the JWT doesn’t

I was at a ‘star party’ recently and a top Australian astronomer there was talking about the next two telescopes being built and they sounded awesome. We think jwt is amazing the next one which is land based I believe, is I think 6 times more powerful and will be able to probe deep dark space.

 

[CD Xbow]

Define alien life forms?

Are we talking microbial life or walking talking barking anthropological form?

My guess is simple life will be extraordinarily common, perhaps even elsewhere in the solar system. Larger life much less common and sentients very rare.

 

[GreyCrow]

My guess is simple life will be extraordinarily common, perhaps even elsewhere in the solar system.

Agreed which was the basis for my question

Larger life much less common and sentients very rare.

I think the Goldilocks planets will be the best bet but the conditions must be a mirror of ours and I cant see that. Dont expect lung functioning beings as an example

 

[TheGoatBaron]

Voyager 1 Just Made A Terrifying Discovery and Turned Back To Earth

blog.sciandnature.com

 

[CD Xbow]

Agreed which was the basis for my question

I think the Goldilocks planets will be the best bet but the conditions must be a mirror of ours and I cant see that. Dont expect lung functioning beings as an example

The way life got going so quickly on Earth, within 500 million years of it's formation suggests to me that planets in the goldilocks zone, if they have liquid water will nearly always form life. Ancient Mars, which was wetter and warmer may have formed simple life early on. That's probably one of the reasons it's of such scientific interest. Here it looks like the earliest life may have started around volcanic vents and they didn't need oxygen at all, in fact it was poison to them.

AC DC sang 'It's a long way to the top if you want to rock and roll', and that is certainly true of complex life, it took another 4 billion years to evolve folks who can make Fender guitars and along the way there was a lot of events that had to happen for Earth to support active, high energy organisms. I suspect this is uncommon. It's a wonderful story, though.

 

[CD Xbow]

David Bowie wrote 'Blessed are the spiders from Mars' and here they are

​

I think the image is about 500m square - they are very naughty not to put a scale on the image. These have been named
araneiforms and appear only in the southern polar region of Mars in the planet's spring. Nasa has been able to recreate the effect in the laboratory.

During the cold winter on Mars, carbon dioxide from the atmosphere freezes on the ground. Then, when spring rolls around, and temperatures rise, this carbon dioxide ice returns to its gaseous state.

This, however, can happen from the bottom of a deposit of ice, with darker mars dirt beneath absorbing the heat. This traps the sublimated gas under the slabs of ice above.

With nowhere for the gas to go, pressure builds until the ice cracks in a small explosion; the carbon dioxide gas escapes through these cracks, carrying darker, dusty material with it. Once all the ice has disappeared back into the atmosphere, a dark, spider-like scar is left behind.

NASA Can Finally Explain Why Creepy 'Spiders' on Mars Keep Appearing

Just what we need. Mars spiders.

www.sciencealert.com